Peter Mercer-Taylor lives in St. Paul, Minnesota, with his wife, Beth, and their three children. The Mercer-Taylor house is strewn with musical instruments, various combinations of which get regular use from all five of them (the most recent addition is a drum kit made of Tupperware, C-clamps, and duct tape). Peter’s own musical commitments, expressed both in his teaching and his scholarship, are divided between 19th-century European classical music, rock-era popular song, and hymnody. After six delightful years of teaching in Valparaiso University’s honors college—where his preponderantly Lutheran colleagues graciously made room for a high-church Episcopalian—Peter joined the musicology faculty at the University of Minnesota, where he has taught since 2001.
Audio Archive
Mercer-Taylor, Peter
Recordings
Making Christian Sense of Contemporary Popular Music – Part 1: "We Walk in the Sun": The Principles of Redemption in 'Seventies Arena' Rock
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2005Making Christian Sense of Contemporary Popular Music – Part 2: "Above the Scarlet Tide": Faith & Doubt in Songs of Loss
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2005Making Christian Sense of Contemporary Popular Music – Part 3: "A Slob Like Us": God as Novelty Song Subject
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2005Making Christian Sense of Contemporary Popular Music – Part 4: "In A Locust Wind": Evaluating Pop's Biblical and Christian Imagery
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2005Making Christian Sense of Contemporary Popular Music – Part 5: "I Sing in the Reaches": When Non-religious Songs do the Work of God
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2005“We’ll Walk in the Sun”: The Notion of Redemption in Seventies Arena Rock
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2009“How Long Must We Sing This Song?”: Faith, Pop Music, and the Unjust Death
Presenter: Mercer-Taylor, Peter / 2009Recent Additions
Vespers January 31, 1976 with Becky Lomax & Dave Caemmerer – Seeing Nature Through God
Vespers January 30, 1976 with John Rieke – Even Faith Is a Gift
Vespers January 27, 1976 with Brad Brainerd – Affirming the Will of God
Vespers January 26, 1976 with Eric Jorstad – I Will Lift Up My Eyes Unto the Mountains
Vespers January 25, 1976 with Carroll Hinderlie – What Christ is to Us, So We Are to All
Audio Archive Partner
Holden wishes to express appreciation to PLU, Pacific Lutheran University, for their support of the Holden Audio Archive Project.
May 10, 2025| there are 2316 presenters in the archive | there are 19581 recordings in the archive | welcome
